How to get Phil Collins’s gated reverb.

Gated reverb master

I see many people wander into this site from Google searching for gated reverb. I wrote a post about the difference between gate reverb and gated reverb some time ago but I never really delved into the details of the how-to.

Gated reverb is a staple 80′s snare sound popularized by artists such as Phil Collins. Many other artists and producers have used it over the years although it is always relacioned to Phil Collins, as seen by the google search “gated reverb collins”.

In any DAW, this technique is pretty simple and easy to do and doesn’t involve a lot of steps.

Ingredients are:

• Snare track
• Aux send
• Effects return track
• Gate with a side-chain
• Judicious amount of reverb, preferably a hall.

Now, when you have all the ingredients together you mix the snare track as you like it, eq’ing and compressing as needed. When you have the snare track as you want it it’s time to send it via an aux to a stereo reverb.

I use Logic and use Logic’s Space Designer to dial up a big hall setting. Remember to have the reverb on 100% wet so the channel only has the reverb sound.

Now insert a gate after the the reverb. Put the threshold as far up as you can, essentially killing the reverb. Now via your side-chain on the gate patch the gate to the snare-drum track.

Now go gate it!

When your gated reverb is side-chained to the snare track you can start fiddling with the parameters of the gate. Reduce the threshold so it starts letting the reverb through. The reverb should breathe in time with the snare drum creating a thick snare drum sound without an excessive reverb trail.

Experimenting with the attack and release you can get different results. A fairly fast attack and medium release in time with the snare creates a sound that sounds like the reverb is being sucked into the snare again.

I like having the attack a little slower. That way you hear the snare sound first and it sounds like the snare is breathing out the reverb before promptly sucking it in again.

Experiment with the parameters until you get something you are satisfied with. Gated reverb can not only be used on a snare, you can experiment with other instruments as well.

Mix in your surroundings.

On slow days when I get stuck in a slump I sometimes have a hard time figuring out what to write about. I mean, there are hundreds of articles and books on eq, compression and mixing.

But I like talking about it and sharing stuff with you so I constantly try to find an interesting perspective on all these books I’ve read, stuff I’ve learned and tricks I’ve experimented with.

Take reverb for instance, I’ve written a fair amount about reverb(link over here) and I’ve read and experimented with loads of digital reverb processors. But sometimes you get lost in all the digitalness(not a word I think) and you never become aware of your surroundings.

Do you guys live in a weird sounding loft in Manhattan? Do you have a really echo-y(and unsafe) elevator shaft you think could sound cool on a recording?

USE IT!

The old echo chambers of yesteryear were just that. Natural reverb chambers. Sure, they were calibrated and built to reverberated perfection, but that doesn’t mean you can’t stumble upon a cool sounding room somewhere.

I read an article about this producer/engineer in TapeOp #69(Check out the magazine). Christina Files told us in this article that she used the elevator shaft in their loft as an echo chamber. That prompted me to wonder how many of our day to day surroundings we can use to our audio advantage.

A friend of mine recorded a band in a house that had a long stairwell so he decided after listening to how cool the stairwell sounded to use it as an echo chamber as well. So there are definitely possibilities when it comes to using your surroundings.

• Buy some long cables.

• Position your microphone where your preferred room sounds the best.

• Position your monitors in the corners or wherever you think they sound best.

• Do you want weird phasing? Put the monitors in weird positions.

• Put one closer than the other.

• Put another in an adjacent room.

• Experiment.

It’s not only to get great sounding or weird sounding echo-y tracks, it’s also for fun and experimentation. Maybe you can’t use it the way you want to, but maybe it adds to the production.

If I didn’t live in an apartment building where I can’t even grill a steak on a barbecue without people complaining I’d definitely go nuts with my outdoor weird sounding elevator patio. I’m sure, when you think hard you could put some of your rooms, hallways or stairwells to good use.

The difference between Gated Reverb and Gate Reverb?

Gated reverb is an effect that was used a lot in the eighties, and is still used sparely today. Phil Collins the artist usually recognized for his super-sounding snare drum with gated reverb. His snare sound still echoes in many tracks today, and audio schools teach Gated Reverb to their students.

What is gated reverb?

Gated reverb is when you feed a snare sound to a big hall reverb but gate it so it only sounds when the snare drum is hit. This is achieved by side-chaining the gate to the snare. And by fiddling with the parameters you can manipulate the attack and character of the reverb.

Phil Collins’s track I wish it would rain down is a good example of the snare reverb sounding only when the snare is hit and then hearing the gate kind of sucking the reverb back into it’s pocket.

But what about this Gate Reverb?

Reverb Gate is used in sound-reinforcement, or live sound. It is when you have a big reverb on the vocals for instance, and you don’t want the drums bleeding into the reverb and bringing muddiness to the FOH sound.

But you still don’t want to cut the microphone out of the mix because it adds to the overrall sound of the stage. Then you gate the aux send so nothing passes except when the signal gets strong enough to go over the threshold. The microphone is still picking up the sound of the stage but it is not being sent to the reverb.

Two almost exact names that name two completely different things?

Yeah, I know it’s a bit complicated. The thing to remember is that with gated reverb you are doing excatly that, you’re gating the reverb, or the output of the reverb. But with gate reverb you are putting a gate before the reverb, essentially the input of the reverb. So that’s basically the difference, whether you put the gate before or after.

One is an effect, the other is a kind of clean-up.

First tip of audiotipaday.com

Hello and welcome. This is the first post of audiotipaday.com. I had the idea of publishing a different, short audio tip every day for all you audio enthusiasts out there. I will try to cover as much as I can regarding recording, mixing, mastering, music theory and writing. These tip will be short and quick to read over your morning coffee or midnight tea, without much complication.

Many of these tips will be tricks I have learned from my professors at SAE Institute in Madrid where I am currently studying. A more detailed bio on me later, but without further ado, the first tip of audiotipaday.com.

You all know the classic reverse reverb, where the reverse seems to swoosh in before the phrase of the singer or the hit of the drum. A neat trick for something different is to record an infinite reverb on a different track and then reverse it.

For example, say you have a slow intermission type middle part and the part before ends on a snare hit. You can record that last snare hit on a different track with a big cathedral like reverb with infinite decay. Then you can reverse the audio part and put it low in the mix, then you have a weird controlled reverbed ambience filling out your slow part.

This tip was taken from my Top Ten Reverb tips and tricks published on www.emusictips.com. Check out the article for more tips, although I will probably post more of them a different day.

Björgvin